I Paid for Parking in Rome

Humor, honesty, and the parts most people leave out.

A few years ago the whole family went to Italy for a few weeks. We landed in Rome and picked up the rental car. I was disappointed that they didn’t seem impressed with my international driver’s license I waited in a long line for at AAA and they basically just handed me the keys.

The drive from the airport to our hotel was ridiculously intense and I hadn’t been that locked in since my days on live television. Apparently drivers there take road rules as suggestions. That’s saying something for a guy who drives daily in Los Angeles and used to drive in New York City. Also, on that drive I may or may not have gone the wrong way down a skinny street that barely fit the Audi I was driving.

We passed historic sites I’d waited a lifetime to see but I stayed focused on the mission at hand. I dropped the fam off at the hotel with the bags and said, "I'll be back in a bit. I'm gonna go find somewhere to park." I said “bit” because I didn’t know if I’d see them again in 10 minutes or the next day.

I find a parking garage not too far away, pull in, find a spot that’s way too tight but I make it work, and walk over to the machine to pay. Of course, everything is in Italian with no English or German options. I don’t speak German but still. As I try to figure out the machine it feels like I'm punching in secret codes no one knows about but me to get to the holy grail. I get rejected every time.

Then, of course, and as if my life was a movie, a few people get in line behind me. I start sweating and hear loud sighs. I'm like, "Man. What’s your boy gonna do?" One thing I wasn’t going to do was ask for help because that would make too much sense and also this thing called pride.

Somehow I figure it out. I select the space, my credit card goes through and a printed receipt I can’t read is in my hand.

I walked back to the hotel like, "Wow. I just drove in Rome. Got my family to the hotel. Found a garage, parked the car and paid for it … in ITALIAN.” I felt like Maximus Decimus Meridius screaming, “Are you not entertained?!”

I don't know if I ever felt taller than my 6 feet in my life.

Sometimes it's the "small" ones that are huge. The stuff that nobody else would count. I think parking in Rome felt so big because I had no idea what I was doing and the older we get the less we put ourselves in positions like that.

When's the last time a "small" thing you did made you feel ten feet tall?

Tony

PS: Hit reply and tell me. I read every one.

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